Grillades with Gravy

History

"Grillades with Gravy" is recorded in Martha McCulloch-Williams's "Dishes & Beverages of the Old South" (1913). A good round steak is flattened by beating and cut into four-inch squares, seasoned highly with salt, pepper and Cayenne. A heaping tablespoon of lard goes into a frying pan and, as it melts, a chopped onion and a chopped clove of garlic; as those brown, a tablespoonful of flour is stirred in smooth. Two sliced tomatoes with their juice follow, and when they brown the grillades are laid on top, covered close and left to brown.

Grillades are a Louisiana dish, and the roux-onion-garlic-tomato base here is recognisably that cooking. But the historical record does not document a specific line of transmission for this particular version, and the previous history's claim — that "early French settlers in Louisiana" brought the technique which was then "adapted to local ingredients" — is an unsourced origin chain of exactly the kind that credits Europeans with a dish and casts everyone else as adapters. It has been removed. Creole and Louisiana cooking was made by French, Spanish, African, Caribbean and Indigenous hands together, and attributing it to one of those is a claim requiring evidence.

"Dishes & Beverages of the Old South" is a mixture of recipes and plantation reminiscence. McCulloch-Williams was a white writer born near Clarksville, Tennessee, who grew up on a plantation before the Civil War; the book's dedication is "to our Mammys," and much of the cooking it records is the work of enslaved and formerly enslaved Black women it does not name.

Ingredients

• 1 round steak
• salt
• pepper
• Cayenne
• 1 heaping tablespoon lard
• 1 onion
• 1 garlic clove
• 1 tablespoon flour
• 2 tomatoes
• 1/2 tablespoon vinegar
• 1 cup water

Instructions

1. Flatten by beating a good round steak, and cut into four-inch-squares.
2. Season the squares highly with salt, pepper, and Cayenne.
3. Put a heaping tablespoon of lard in a frying pan. As it melts, add a chopped onion, a clove of garlic also chopped.
4. As these brown, add one tablespoonful of flour, stirring all smooth.
5. Next add two sliced tomatoes with their juice. When they brown, lay the grillades upon them.
6. Cover close, let them brown on one side, then turn and brown the other.
7. Then add half a tablespoonful of vinegar, and a cup of water. Stir well.
8. Then set where it will simmer for half an hour.
9. Another way is to cook the grillades without garlic, and add to them along with the tomatoes half a pint of tender okra well washed and sliced.
10. Or they can be fried brown, in clear fat, then put in a hot dish over boiling water while a gravy is made of fresh fat, heated very hot, and stirred about the pan to take up the brown meat essence, a chopped onion, two sliced tomatoes, a tablespoonful flour, as much vinegar and water.
11. Season to taste with salt, pepper, and Cayenne, boil ten to twelve minutes and pour over the grillades.